


two steps forward and five steps hence

by kimaracretak



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Complicated Relationships, F/F, First Kiss, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:47:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28044897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimaracretak/pseuds/kimaracretak
Summary: There's plenty of worse places to be than a crappy flophouse on a crappy no-name moon getting ready to meet equally crappy arms dealers. Jyn's been in a fair number of those places, just never with someone quite so insufferable.
Relationships: Jyn Erso/Leia Organa
Comments: 6
Kudos: 28
Collections: Star Wars Rare Pairs 2020





	two steps forward and five steps hence

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dragonfly_wings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonfly_wings/gifts).



"This?" Jyn's bag hits the floor with a dull thud, and she wrinkles her nose against the cloud of dust that rises. "This is the room I'm supposed to secure."

"That generally falls under a bodyguard's job description, yes," Leia says, stepping up behind her and shutting the door with a click. The dust is still under her feet, and Jyn grits her teeth against saying something that she'd - not _regret_ , necessarily, but that would definitely make her next three days harder than they were already going to be. "It could be worse, after all."

And the thing is, Jyn knows she's right: there's plenty of worse places to be than a crappy flophouse on a crappy no-name moon getting ready to meet equally crappy arms dealers. Jyn's been in a fair number of those places, just never with someone quite so insufferable.

Which might not strictly be fair to Leia, who has been on what Jyn suspects is her absolute best behaviour since they left Hoth, but even that polished politeness is getting under her skin in a way that Jyn is finding herself unprepared for. She wants ... she isn't sure what she wants, and that might be most of the problem, but she does know she wants something more than this.

Leia keeps a firm grip on her own bag as she steps further into their room. Five paces to the single bed, another ten to the far wall and the grimy glass window. The hallway on the other side wavers almost imperceptibly under the dirt, but as soon as Leia prods at it with a fingertip, it flickers to black for almost a full second.

"Cute," Jyn says, and Leia snorts in something that might be amusement. It's the most genuine sound Jyn has ever heard from her, and she almost hates herself for how much she wants to hear it again.

How much she wants to be the cause of Leia making that sound again.

"I suppose we don't really need a view," Leia says as the hallway comes back, and Jyn wonders if she's imagining the slight hint of wistfulness in her voice. "We're here for work, after all."

"It's different than - what we've had, at least." Jyn's lips twist around the words, unaccustomed to the care in choosing them. They're both wearing signal disruptors, but they'd agreed to treat the rooms as compromised until they'd done a check for bugs - and after, Jyn had privately promised herself.

Speaking of - "Can you check the bed? My feet are killing me." Leia's words drag Jyn out of her thoughts.

"For what, a bomb?" Jyn asks, unable to keep the sarcasm completely out of her voice.

Leia's eyes cloud over immediately, all the possibility of warmth closed off. "Wouldn't be the first time," is all she says, and Jyn's used to feeling like an asshole but she's much less used to feeling bad about it.

But Leia has a point, and Jyn had known it before she spoke, so Jyn pushes it out of her head and drops to her knees, pulls out her gloves and runs her fingers along the edges of the frame and mattress. "Clear," she mutters when she's satisfied that, listening devices or no, sitting down won't be immediately lethal.

Leia sits down with a sigh, facing the flickering screen. "Did they tell you I requested you for this?"

It takes Jyn a minute to put it together - Leia is so much better at saying things without saying them than she is, a whole language that comes as easily to her as throwing a punch does to Jyn - but when she does she nearly trips over her bag trying to get up. "What do you mean?" Turn around, she thinks, wants to say - but she doesn't know what she'd do if Leia did.

She doesn't. Jyn imagines her biting her lip, fiddling with the hem of her tunic, all the little nervous tics that any normal person in Leia's position would have but that she's never seen the Princess succumb to.

"I know all about you," she says finally. "All your files. All the things that ... people ... think are important. Names and numbers and I always, thought, well, there has to be more than that."

Something curls in the bottom of Jyn's stomach, cold and hungry. Leia needs to stop - she needs to stop this. The room isn't secure, she isn't sure if the door even locks, and both of them have to be in something better than top form if they have any hope of getting out of their meeting with more than half of what they want.

All the irritation of the past few days is itching at the back of her tongue, mixing with the horrible possibilities of where they are, out at the edge of Wild Space. It feels like the moment just before she and Cassian had been swept up off the surface of Scarif, the same sense of almost. And Leia's still talking.

"It's more than that, though. You're more than that. And I don't want to know just because of work, but because -"

"You could hate me. Should." Jyn doesn't mean to interrupt her but the words come out anyway, not nearly as harsh as they have been every time Jyn has imagined herself saying them. She usually says, _Princess_ , usually follows it up with, _because of what my father did_ , but she can't say those things now.

Maybe she doesn't have to. Maybe she's picked up more of Leia's diplomatic silences than she'd meant to.

 _Look at me_. But she doesn't say that either.

"I could hate you," Leia agrees, and it's like a knot around Jyn's heart has loosened. "Maybe I should. But I think I'm tired of that, now."

Jyn scoffs, and Leia's laugh in response is almost kind. "Sit with me," she says, and Jyn can't think of a good reason not to walk around the foot of the bed. To sit next to Leia, to rest a hand on her knee.

"This isn't really how I imagined us talking," she says, and hopes Leia's smiling. "Actually, I'm not sure I imagined us talking at all."

"Oh?" Leia says, and when she reaches out to tip Jyn's head up Jyn finds her eyes shining with amusement. "I can think of plenty things we can do that don't involve talking."

Her kiss is sharp and fleeting and still enough to leave Jyn breathless when she pulls back much too soon. "After," she says, and it sounds like a real promise, one that Jyn finds herself wanting to believe in.


End file.
